Andrew Jordan took a comfortable victory in the opening race of the British Touring Car Championship at Rockingham in a thrilling race which saw Mat Jackson finish in second and Rob Austin third.
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Pirtek Racing’s Jordan took the lead from poleman Jason Plato on the opening lap, getting a much better start and passing on the exit of the Deene hairpin.
Further back in the pack, however, there was contact on the opening lap between several cars at Gracelands, with Tom Onslow-Cole and Daniel Welch spinning in avoidance of an incident between Will Bratt and Adam Morgan. Andy Neate and Liam Griffin were also caught up in the accident, with Neate crashing into the stricken Welch. The safety car was therefore called out for five laps as the cars were cleared up.
Even before the race resumed, Honda’s Matt Neal continued to find the conditions tricky and spun out of fourth position at the Brook chicane, dropping down to 21st.
Airwaves Racing’s Jackson, who had been in fourth after the restart, was clearly enjoying the tricky conditions and quickly passed Plato for third in lap ten. A handful of laps later he worked his way past Honda’s Gordon Shedden to take a superb second place finish, equalling his best result of the season so far.
Shedden had been running in third for much of the race, but lost out to a hard-charging Austin at the finish line, with the Audi driver having been the fastest man on the track in the final laps, having passed MG’s Plato on only lap 17.
Shedden thus finished in fourth, just 0.200 seconds behind Austin, with Plato finishing fifth. WSR’s Colin Turkington worked his way up from ninth on the grid to finish in sixth, ahead of eBay Motors team-mate Rob Collard.
Dave Newhsma brough his Speedworks Motorsport Toyota home in eighth, having slipped down the order from fifth in the early stages of the race.
Team HARD’s Jack Goff and Dynojet’s Frank Wrathall completed the top ten.
Following his earlier spin, Neal made his way into the points in 14th place to score a valuable two points.
MG’s Sam Tordoff, who had started from the front row of the grid, had a disastrous race as he struggled in the slippery conditions. The 24-year-old slipped down the order throughout the race and finished outside the points in 16th.
Lea Wood took victory in the Jack Sear’s Trophy ahead of David Nye, securing his lead in the category.
Round 23 takes place at 14:02 BST (15:02 CEST).